This story was originally published on YachatsNews.com and is used with permission.
Lincoln County Commissioner Kaety Jacobson, a popular and hardworking community leader and politician, announced Friday she is resigning from the commission Feb. 14 with two years left in her term.
Jacobson announced her decision late in the day via a letter to colleagues and the community. Jacobson was not available for further comment Friday night, but in a Facebook post she said it was simply time to focus on other issues.
“Stepping up into leadership is a hard decision to make and stepping down is equally hard,” Jacobson said in her post. “But often I find that you just know when it’s time, and that is certainly the case.”
Jacobson twice easily won election to a seat on the three-member commission – ousting a longtime incumbent in May 2018 and then besting three challengers in May 2022.
Jacobson’s replacement will be appointed by the two remaining commissioners, Claire Hall and Casey Miller, to serve out the rest of her term, which ends Dec. 31, 2026. Jacobson’s announcement said county officials will explain that process next week.
Her resignation comes at a fraught time in county leadership. Miller is the subject of a bullying and harassment investigation, Hall barely won re-election to her sixth term in November, and there are organizational issues and tension swirling around administrator Tim Johnson and counsel Kristin Yuille – who both report directly to commissioners.
In a six-paragraph resignation letter, Jacobson said that while she is stepping down from the commission she planned “to continue working on issues important to our community and pursue them with even greater focus.”
In her Facebook post, Jacobson said there are issues that she loves working on.
“It has always been about the work for me. Producing results, getting things done. And I am pursuing that work with a deeper focus.”
Jacobson said she and her husband, Hatfield Marine Science Center administrator Mark Farley, “are committed to this community, so we won’t be going anywhere except for our occasional family adventures.”
Before her election in 2018, Jacobson spent 20 years working on marine science and education issues, including 15 years with Oregon Sea Grant. She and Farley are longtime foster parents.
Hall and Miller, who were notified of the resignation by Yuille, said Jacobson would be missed.
“Commissioner Jacobson’s resignation is a huge loss to our board and to Lincoln County,” Hall said in a statement to YachatsNews. “She has helped vulnerable children, fire survivors and others. She’s been tireless in bringing grant funds to help pay for these things. Her legacy will be a lasting one.”
Miller said Jacobson’s resignation was a “complete surprise.”
“She demonstrated many attributes of tenacity and resilience required of an elected official during her tenure,” Miller said in a statement. “Her dedication to north county’s wildfire survivors, her passion to optimize American Rescue Plan Act dollars and her pursuit of grant funding for the benefit of our community are a few of her accomplishments that I greatly appreciate.”
